Famous First Words: Come, my darling, close the window. --Eugene Ionesco The Chairs
Happy Earth Day!! …. I agree with George Carlin that we (meaning people in general) are arrogant to think we (usually meaning they) are a threat to the planet. This planet put up with dinosaurs for 165 million years then waited another 65 million before putting up with people. Do any of you think people, humans, can last 165 million years? Think about it. Anyone? Me neither. I took a very unscientific survey and I didn't find a single soul who thought we could make it even one million years. In fact a few people thought we might not make it to the end of the decade. / Earth existed for 4 and a half billion years before people showed up at all. The planet used to run the whole great plains with nothing but a bunch of buffalo and some prairie dogs. Besides, it has only been that last 2 or 3 hundred years that we have been seriously mistreating Earth.
..........I see skies of blue, clouds of white.........Louis Armstrong …..It's A Wonderful World
Make peace with the universe. Take joy in it. It will turn to gold. --Rumi
It is a cloudy but warm (70°F) Friday morning. Clouds are flowing from the south up to the north; they flow quickly as if fleeing some danger behind them or eagerly awaiting the pleasures that lie just ahead. The wind below them whips tree limbs and fills the air with single pedals of the white flowers that cover trees all over town. Birds – from tiny sparrows to high flying hawks – fill the air with moving specks and graceful songs. Wind pushes against my body and plays with my face and my hair. Last night's rain makes the world smell like damp soil and wet foliage. Earth insists on being beautiful for her day and sends the winds to blow the flowers about so the picture is moving yellows and whites and blues and reds. I have to admit, 4.5 billion years old and she still looks wonderful. But now I sit indoors watching the willow dance outside my window. I sip decaf – sweetened and creamed – and think about you. Great morning, really great.
Here's hoping your weekend is filled with fresh air, clean water, and springtime, ePistliers
NOTICE: There will be no ePistle next week. On Thursday Next**, plumbers are coming to dig a hole in my bedroom floor to fix plumbing that runs under the house. On Friday, workers are coming to replace the carpet that will have been taken out to allow the plumbers to dig up my floor. We do not yet know how long it will take the carpet layers, so no ePistle next week. See you again May 6th. **This is a pun on one of my favorite fantasy series, Thursday Next. She is a detective in the JurisFiction Department (SpecOps 27) and once ran an anger management group for the characters of Wuthering Heights.
First Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: It is an old error of man to forget to put quotation marks where he borrows from a woman's brain. --Anna Garlin Spencer
It is not the planet that is in danger but our existence on it. If we're lucky, Earth may not have noticed us yet.
Reminds me of a joke...
Earth and Mars ran into each other at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. "Hey, Terra, wassup?" Mars asks. Earth throws up her hands, "Seriously, not too close, I've infested with homo sapiens.” “Don't worry, Sweetie,” Mars said, “they never last long.”
So here are a few non-pharmaceutical, home remedies that Earth might try.
..........When the sky is a bright canary yellow.........Mitzi Gaynor …..Cockeyed Optimist
Trivia Questions: Happy Jelly Bean Day!!
^ Where did the jelly bean originate?
^^ Which candy making method allows for a hard outer shell with a soft jelly center?
^^^ How long does it take to make a jelly bean?
^^^^ Which US president was a jelly bean lover?
^^^^^ What US company is the leading jelly bean vendor?
Big Hello: As-salȃmo 'alaykom - Dari (Afghanistan & Pakistan) https://www.omniglot.com/language/phrases/hello.htm
Second Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: The decline of civilization can be traced back to when they stopped putting toys in cereal boxes. --Submitted by bc of tx
Max Picture of the Week: Max and the Easter Egg Hunt
Fake Library Statistics of the Week: 23% of librarians have answered a reference question in a public restroom not at a library. https://www.facebook.com/FakeLibStats/?fref=ts
Wrath: Floods, fires, tidal waves, earthquakes, volcanos, droughts, storms ...you know the routine. It's actually very easy for Earth to do this because people keep mucking with the atmosphere. / Drought may have brought us lettuce that cost more than an hourly wage; but it also means your backyard may soon be seaside property.
..........I've never seen the sun shining so bright.........Willie Nelson …..Blue Skies
Moonbeam: Our imagination flies – we are its shadow on the earth. --Vladimir Nabokov
Meditation of the Week: If you are not French, can you be a true existentialist?
Puzzle of the Week: Last week's challenge came from listener Ari Ofsevit, of Boston. Think of a 5-letter word with an "L" that is pronounced. Add a letter at the start to get a 6-letter word in which the "L" is silent. Then add a new letter in the fifth position to get a 7-letter word in which the "L" is pronounced again. What words are these?
Blonde Man Joke of the Week: A blonde man shouts into the phone, “My wife is pregnant and her contractions are only 2 minues apart?” “Is this her first child?” “ No,” he shouts, “this is her husband.” --Submitted by bc of tx
Next Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: Since the universe has no center, you can't be it. --Neil deGrasse Tyson
Week of the Week: Fiddler's Frolic (21-24) The worst pub I've ever been in was called “The Fiddle”; it was a vile inn. / What do you call a hobbit playing fiddle? Lord of the Strings
If that doesn't work, Earth could...
Fire the Moon: Our sunward neighbors have no satellites at all and Mars only has those two small, hyperactive ... balls. So as the inner planets go, Luna is kind of conspicuous consumption. My planet may be mostly salt water but look at the size of her moon. / Besides, the moon has been slowly moving away...over the eons. Perhaps planning to slip out into the solar system while Earth isn't looking ... make its way to the asteroid belt ... see if there is something with better advancement potential. I can't believe it. 4 billion years old and I still have a curfew.
..........Gray skies are gonna clear up.........Dick Van Dyke …..Put On A Happy Face
^ While it is known that jelly beans were invented in the US, the inspiration may come from Turkish Delights, which come from Turkey. The similarities between these jelly treats are what spurred this rumor! Turkish delights are cubed, jelly treats. Both Turkish delights and jelly beans are jelly candy, but jelly beans are turned into the bean shape with a shell and Turkish delights are just rolled in powdered sugar.
Almanac: It is Friday, April 22, 2022. The moon will go into the last quarter tomorrow and is in Capricorn. It is UN: International Mother Earth Day, Chemists Celebrate The Earth Day, Earth Day, Girl Scout Leaders Day, Global Selfie Earth Day (NASA), In God We Trust Day, Mother Earth Day, and National Jelly Bean Day. In Nebraska it is Arbor Day.
Among those born on this day were Isabella I (1451), Alexander VIII (1610), Giuseppe Torelli (1658), Henry Fielding (1707), Madame de Stael (1766), Henry Clay (1777), Philip James Bailey (1816), Guilherme Antonio Cossoul (1828), Ethel Mary Smyth (1858), Nikolai Lenin (1870), Otto Rank (Rosenfeld, 1884), Sergei S. Prokofiev (1891), Vladimir Nabokov (1899), Robert Oppenheimer (1904), Lord Airedale (1915), Sidney Nolan (1917), Charles Mingus (1922), Charlotte Rae (1926), John Llewellyn (1933), Jack Nicholson (1937), Spencer Haywood (1949), Peter Frampton (1950), and Ryan Stiles (1959).
On April twenty-second the supernova Crab nebula was seen by the naked eye (1056), Halley's Comet was recorded (1073), the erection of the Bastille began (1370), Henry VIII ascended the throne (1509), the first US slave revolt occurred (SC, 1526), the Royal Society incorporated (1662), the Netherlands and Műnster signed a peace treaty (1674), Curaҁao prohibited the use of white paint due to fierce sunlgiht (1817), Nebraska celebrated the first ever Arbor Day (1872), Oklahoma land rush opened (1889), US blockaded Cuba (1898), the Ameircan Power Boat Association formed (1903), Babe Ruth played his first professional game (1914), México ended diplomatic relations with the US (1914), the first NBA Championship was played (Philadelphia beat Chicago, 1947), Les Chaises premiered (1952), the USSR joined UNESCO (1954), the KC Athletics played their first game (1955), the first human eye transplant was performed (1969), the first Earth Day was held (1970), Young and Duke spent the day on the moon (1972), the Blues Brothers first appeared on SNL (1978), 10,000 copper workers in Chile struck (1981), the Soyuz T-8 returned to Earth (1983), Lebanon released hostage Robert Polhill after 39 months (1990), and Denmark created the world's largest lollipop (3,011 pounds, 1994).
Night Sky, 4/22: The last-quarter Moon rises as late as 3 am daylight-saving time Saturday morning, in Capricornus far to the lower right of Altair. It's exactly last-quarter at 7:56 am Saturday morning EDT. http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/sky-at-a-glance/
Image of the Week: Serpentine Galaxy NGC 5921 photographed by the Hubble on 4/8/22
This Week: Saturday, April 23 – National Dance Day & Talk Like Shakespeare Day
Sunday, April 24 – Blue Sunday & Mother, Father Deaf Day
Night Sky, 4/24 : Vega, the Summer Star, the zero-magnitude equal of Arcturus, is now twinkling low in the northeast after nightfall. . . depending on your latitude. The farther north you are the higher it will be. If you're in the latitudes of the southern US, you'll have to wait until a bit later after dark for it to appear.
Monday, April 25 – DNA Day & Licence Plates Day & Red Hat Society Day
Tuesday, April 26 – Audubon Day & Hug An Australian Day & Lesbian Visibility Day
Wednesday, April 27 – Denim Day & Morse Code Day & Walk at Lunch Day
Night Sky, 4/27: Venus, magnitude –4.4, is the bright "Morning Star" shining low in the southeast during dawn. Mars and Saturn glimmer to Venus's upper right, in that order. They're vastly fainter: almost identical at magnitudes +1.1 and +0.9. Mars, however, is more orange than pale yellow Saturn. Each morning they're a little farther from Venus and from each other.
Thursday, April 28 – Poem In Your Pocket Day & Workers Memorial Day & National Superhero Day
It's possible that humans would die out in a generation without the moon to spur their romantic fantasies. But I don't think Earth can count on that. / Without the moon the Earth will Wobble. Oops, misleading...the earth already wobbles now but it holds onto the moon so that it doesn't actually stagger. Hey, it's 4 1/2 billion years old. I'm only 78 and I wobble when I walk.
..........Can you see the tears roll down the street.........Stevie Ray Vaughn …..The Sky Is Crying
^^ Jelly beans are made using a candy process from France called “panning”. The process of panning makes it so the outer shell of the jelly bean is hard and the inside is gooey and jelly-like. The same process is used to make Jordan Almonds and used to be done by hand before machines were made for this purpose.
Preantepenultimate Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: If you learn religion from a fox, you believe stealing chickens is a virtue. --Turkish Proverb --Submitted by bd of ny
Moonbeam: What's vice today may be virtue, tomorrow. --Henry Fielding
Strange Fact of the Week: Facial recognition software can pick a person out of a crowd but the vending machine at work can’t recognize a dollar bill with a bent corner.
Video of the Week: Miranda Khan reading The Blossom of Floraland by Meredith & Miranda Khan https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVTPWxYiDyrmUa9Sb-xW76A?app=desktop ~~M & M Khan are the daughters of Joyce Frass Kahn with whom I was friends in high school and still see every week.
Not So Late Night Snacks of the Week: Halloween reappears in a dandy form
With this sausage I feel like a man reborn
I'm filling this meat
With triangular treats
I'm stuffing my bratwurst with candy corn.
--Bill Kurtis Wait Wait Don't Tell Me 10/23/21
There is a community of the spirit. Join it. --Rumi
So the wobble becomes irregular and the pitch becomes much greater...or maybe it's yaw. Anyway it would cause quakes and volcanic eruptions and weather to rival the great eye on Jupiter. Real Wrath of Goddess stuff (Dr. Stantz) ... / Tides would disappear. In Kansas that won't make much difference until our backyards are beachfront property, but Florida would notice. Right away.
..........The pale yellow moon shone in his eyes.........Paul Simon …..Under African Skies
^^^ Due to the panning process used to make jelly beans, it takes up to 7-14 days to make just one bean!
Antepenultimate Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: Whatever you say will be used against you in my novel.
Weird Word of the Week: Metoposcopist: A person who practices metoposcopy, the art of judging a person's character and fortune from his face, principally his forehead. https://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-met1.htm
Ollie's Very Own Picture of the Week: Ollie and the Easter Egg Hunt
Old Weird Word of the Week: betrump (be-TRUMP) verb tr: 1) To deceive or cheat 2) To elude From be + French tromper (to deceive), which also gave us trumpery. First documented use 1522. https://wordsmith.org/
Wacky Uses for Common Products: Brush your teeth. Plain baking soda is a gentle abrasive that cleans like the strongest toothpaste. Apply Arm & Hammer Baking Soda to a damp toothbrush, brush as usual, and rinse. Note: Arm & Hammer Baking Soda does not contain fluoride. https://www.wackyuses.com/wacky/armhammer2.html
There wouldn't be any more honeymoons. We'd have to drink corn squeezin's instead of moonshine. People born in the sign of Cancer would become children of, I don't know, that 9th planet that exists mathematically but nobody can quite find. Actually, that kind of fits Cancer, doesn't it?
...........With your eye so big and shiney.........Neville Brothers …..Yellow Moon
^^^^ After Ronald Reagan became President in 1981, the general public became aware of his preference for Jelly Belly jelly beans. The company supplied Reagan with Jelly Belly jelly beans during his eight years of presidency. ~~And none of the beans or the cash ever trickled down.
Penultimate Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: A woman has sparked controversy online after she ripped off the part of the Bible asking wives to be submissive to their husbands, and used it to smoke weed. --Submitted by MMS
Science Fiction Convention of the Week: Penguicon 2022 (22-24, Detroit) Imagine a place where all geeky interests are represented, explored, and respected. https://2022.penguicon.org/
Vintage Players One Liner of the Week: Don't worry what people think, they don't do it often.
Actual Science Conference of the Week: Variational Analysis & Optimization (20-21, Ann Arbor & Online) A bilevel optimization problem is a special class of optimization problem partly constrained by another optimization problem. https://events.umich.edu/event/92789 ~~Sigh.....And they wonder why people don't take science seriously
Answer to Puzzle of the Week: Older → Solder → Soldier
Nights would be very, very dark. Upside, we would be able to see the stars really well. / If we lived towards the center of the Milky Way where the cool galaxians live we'd see like a million more stars than we do now, out here in the boondocks at the end of this spiral tentacle. (They call it an arm, but it's a tentacle. They try to sugar coat it.)
..........Press your space face close to mine, love..........David Bowie …..Moonage Daydream
^^^^^ Jelly Belly company is reported to be the biggest jelly bean purveyor in the US. However, Jelly Belly also DOMINATES any information you find on line about jelly beans, so who knows. ~~The only other candy Jelly Belly sells is candy corn.
Quote of the Week: I must move to Florida so my children will be safe from math. / Rather than wear a mask while traveling, just talk loudly about your testicle tanning regimen. That will create a safe social-distancing zone.--Rex Huppke --Submitted by sb of ar
Final Funniest Thing I Read of the Week: I need to get in shape. If I were murdered right now, my chalk outline would be a circle. --Submitted by jm of ks
Today's Peace of History, April 22, 1970: Earth Day honors Rachel Carson, a woman who changed America and greatly influenced the environmental movement with her revolutionary book, Silent Spring. On the first Earth Day observance, an estimated 20 million participated in peaceful demonstrations of concern for the environment across the U.S.
Nocturnal animals would have a hard time. They'd bump into trees and not be able to find things they eat. When you walked out of your house in the morning, owls would ask for directions home.
..........Snow time ain't no time to stay outdoors and spoon.........Kate Smith …..Shine On Harvest Moon
Masthead of the Week: Friday ePistle April 22, 2022, Green ePistle 22. Online at: http://fridayepistle.blogspot.com/ Exclusive editor: Christine Smith. 2511 Morningside Dr. Lawrence, KS 66047
Moonbeam: Never trust sheep. --Ryan Styles
Cost of War:
As of 4/21/22 State Department War on Terror Costs since 2001: $176,079,080,436
As of 4/14/22 State Department War on Terror Costs since 2001: $175,528,189,760
As of 4/21/22 Interest on War Debt since 2001: $1,050,910,158,392.
As of 4/14/22 Interest on War Debt since 2001: $1,049,371,500,770.
As of 4/21/22 Homeland Security Costs since 2001: $1,102,965,088,735.
As of 4/14/22 Homeland Security Costs since 2001: $1,102,366,720,881.
As of 4/21/22 Veterans Care since 2001: 2,391,429,504.901 .
As of 4/14/22 Veterans Care since 2001: 2,379,766,119.092 .
As of 4/21/22 Military Costs of War since 2001: $2,957,598,550,913.
As of 4/14/22 Military Costs of War since 2001: $2,956,430,316,264.
As of 4/21/22 Total Cost of Wars since 2001: $7,678,984,845,810.
As of 4/14/22 Total Cost of Wars since 2001: $7,663,465,306,658.
https://www.nationalpriorities.org/cost-of/
All your anxiety is because of your desire for harmony. Seek disharmony, then you will gain peace. --Rumi
Famous Last Words: ...soul man. --The Blues Brothers first appearance on SNL
..........The lovers, the dreamers and me.........Kermit the Frog …..Rainbow Connection
Finally, take a moment to contemplate what would happen to menstrual cycles ... and what that might mean for a weary world. --Non-Pharmaceutical Remedies for an Infestation of Homo Sapiens by Christine Smith
May Peace play in your mountains
And Joy swim in your waters
prairie mama
christine
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